


Saudade

by alwaysforevan



Category: Big Bang (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-06
Updated: 2013-06-06
Packaged: 2017-12-14 04:16:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/832627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alwaysforevan/pseuds/alwaysforevan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Seungri knows what love feels like, and Jiyong isn't in love (not with him).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Saudade

**Author's Note:**

> \+ I wrote this one a little less than a week ago, before I posted Fine Line. I had a lot of personal feelings and I decided to dump the feelings on Nyongtory.  
> \+ Beta'd by the wonderful Evan, so all lingering mistakes are mine. Please point them out.

Seung Ri can see Ji Yong sitting on the steps of the girl’s house. Ji Yong looks defeated, eyes vacant as he stares down at the ground, and Seung Ri understands. Ji Yong was never loved by the girl, and now Seung Ri can see the weight of this realization pressing into Ji Yong’s shoulders, making him curl and hunch over himself.

There is nothing worse than loving someone who doesn’t love you back. Unrequited love comes with an acute feeling of physical and emotional loneliness that is difficult to shake off and ignore. Seung Ri knows this, knows that Ji Yong will never love him, and yet there isn’t much he can do about it anyway.

Love, no matter what shape or form it takes, happens to be a very powerful and unreasonable force. Even if you throw logic at it, or push it as hard as you can, it doesn’t go away.

At some point, Seung Ri just gave up throwing and pushing.

“Hyung,” Seung Ri whispers. He can hear the loneliness in his own voice. Sometimes he’s surprised, but mostly he’s grateful, that others can’t seem to hear it. “You’ve been sitting there for over an hour. You should go home.”

Ji Yong is the one who called him over—God knows why, when Young Bae was totally available—and yet now Ji Yong ignores him. Seung Ri sits beside him on the porch, distantly wondering if the girl would mind, but shaking the thought away easily.

It is at this point that Seung Ri would say something encouraging—would, if he didn’t understand Ji Yong’s loneliness completely. Loneliness is loud, Seung Ri thinks. You can’t talk over it.

The sky darkens a little overhead. Seung Ri sits there in the silence, listening to Ji Yong’s loneliness and trying to quell his own. Seung Ri doesn’t bother touching Ji Yong, doesn’t bother slapping him comfortingly on the back or putting an arm over his shoulder, because it wouldn’t be right. One lonely person should never comfort another lonely person. That only makes the loneliness louder.

Through the silence, and the loneliness, Ji Yong says, “Love hurts, maknae. Love really fucking hurts.”

Seung Ri glances down at the space between them, the small gap between their bodies that seems to extend forever, and then up at the sky. “It’s going to rain soon. We should get you home.”

Seung Ri’s surprised the girl hasn’t shooed them away yet.

Ji Yong hesitates for a minute, but he stands and walks down the steps slowly, as if the weight of his love and his loneliness is making it hard for him to walk. Even his clothes look heavy.

Seung Ri follows Ji Yong down the driveway and sidewalk, keeping himself at a safe and comfortable distance behind, because his own clothes are beginning to feel heavy, too. Ji Yong doesn’t mind the space; he’s lost in his thoughts, probably drowning in whatever words the girl said to him.

“Why did you call me?”

Ji Yong startles a little, looking over his shoulder. “What?”

“Young Bae wasn’t doing anything. You could’ve called him to come pick you up.”

“Did it bother you?”

“No, I’m just wondering why you called.”

Ji Yong pauses, and turns his head forward. He walks for a while before he answers, “Young Bae would have worried. He would’ve asked me what happened.” Ji Yong laughs. The sound of it is all jagged and broken. “You talk a lot, but when you worry, you’re quiet.”

Seung Ri pushes his hands deep into his coat pockets. “You’ll live.”

“Hmm?”

“You’ll live,” Seung Ri repeats. He smiles, and he has the feeling that his smile is all jagged and broken, too. “Love will hurt, but it won’t kill you. You’ll live.”

Ji Yong slows down even further, casting a long and narrow glance at the younger man. “You talk like love has hurt you before.”

“When a star dies,” Seung Ri starts, “depending on the size of the star, it can collapse into a black hole.”

Ji Yong laughs again, and this time it’s better, this time it sounds a little less like shattered glass and more like a rough diamond. Ji Yong’s laugh is radiant, stunning, and probably brighter than the sun. Seung Ri feels the cavity in his chest tighten and compress the longer he stares at it.

“Weird maknae,” Ji Yong mutters, but there’s a trace of a smile on his face that seems to lighten the weight of his love and loneliness and propel him forward.

They continue walking, quietly but comfortably, through the city. The sky grows darker by degrees, hues of gray coloring the sky, and the air itself feels moist. There’s a wetness forming on the ridges of the leaves and the trees are giving off a fresh scent. Seung Ri smells the rain before he feels it.

“Ah,” Ji Yong sighs, and holds out his palm as the rain starts falling. “Even the sky is sad.” He chuckles a little and looks back at Seung Ri. “You didn’t bring an umbrella? It’s getting late; you can sleep over.”

Love is a very stupid thing, Seung Ri thinks. It’s a thought he has often. Love will fill you with delusions, hopes and dreams that’ll never be anything more, and a sting of anger and disappointment whenever your delusions don’t match your reality. Love is irrational, making you believe in things you know aren’t possible, not in this life or the next. Seung Ri doesn’t remember a single time in his life when someone he loved didn’t hurt him.

“Okay,” Seung Ri says. “I’ll stay over tonight.”

When they get to Ji Yong’s apartment, they’re drenched and their clothes are literally heavy, saturated with water and clinging to their skin. Ji Yong immediately goes to take off his shirt, urging Seung Ri to do the same.

“If you don’t take it off, you’ll catch a cold,” Ji Yong murmurs, stepping around his furniture while trying not to get water on everything. “I’ll get us towels and extra shirts.”

Seung Ri does as he’s told and watches Ji Yong move around. The muscles in Ji Yong’s back are sharp, twitching and rippling with every movement, but Seung Ri feels nothing but a suffocating feeling of pining and longing. It’s a pain that comes with unrequited love—the want to touch, but not being able to do so. It isn’t arousal; it’s the desire to draw a person close to you so that you can feel their bare skin and their warmth against your heart. It’s sappy, and it’s crippling.

Ji Yong brings Seung Ri a towel, which Seung Ri buries his face in instantly. The towel smells like Ji Yong’s favorite cologne and Seung Ri wants to scream because everything is so unfair. He holds it in though, and rubs his face slowly, trying to get the material of the towel to somehow absorb all the excess feelings he has.

“Do you want something to eat?”

Seung Ri wraps the towel around his shoulders and notices the two shirts draped over the side of the couch, a black one and a white one. He picks the black one and pulls it on, ignoring the scent of Ji Yong. “Yeah, sure.”

Ji Yong dries himself off quickly, pulling the white shirt over his head and throwing the towel on the nearest seat. He looks distracted. “I’ll make you something.”

Seung Ri watches Ji Yong the whole way, until the older man disappears into the kitchen and the noises of cooking reach his ears. Then Seung Ri focuses on the window beside him, streaks of rain painting designs on the window’s surface.

For a moment, Seung Ri thinks that this must be what love feels like—the person you love cooking for you, while you sit on their couch and stare out their window into the vast city. This must be it, this feeling of closeness and security, when the outside world is cold and alone, and knowing that you have someone and that someone has you.

Love must be calling someone at any time and knowing they’ll come. Love must be walking with someone in peaceful silence. Love must be wanting to touch, not to arouse. Love must be happiness.

Seung Ri knows that Ji Yong will never love him.


End file.
